Frederick ‘Ted’ Howden

Regimental Chaplain

Clovis Man Returns from Luzon Prison

SAN FRANCISCO — APR. 11, 1945 — First Sgt. James M. Hamilton, Clovis, N.M., is among American soldiers who have reached here en route to their homes after being freed from Japanese prison camps in the Philippines.

He was with a group including 46 Americans and 14 British arriving yesterday aboard a Navy transport. The Americans were sent to Letterman General Hospital.

John Hamilton

February 19, 2004

Sendai Camp #8, Kosaka

Soldier Helped Him Survive Death March

During the Death March, the prisoners Jack Finley was with were made to run a gauntlet. Sick for having drank bad water, Finley credited Sgt. James B. Heard, the son of a former Hobbs, New Mexico mayor, for his salvation.

“We knew we had to walk past them and so, as we approached them, we started running. What they were trying to do was knock us down so they could beat us to death. I felt all these poles hitting my back and arms, but I thought I was still going to make it through. Just about the time I thought I had made it, one of the Japanese soldiers shined a flashlight in my eyes and blinded me while another one hit me over the head with one of those big bamboo clubs and I started falling. As the Japanese soldiers started to surround me, this J. B. Heard guy I was with just lunged right through the group of them like a football player and grabbed me by the waist and pulled me free. When I finally came to, I saw the road going by and realized I was being carried. He finally put me on my feet and someone else did first aid to my head because it was split open and bleeding. The Japanese didn't follow us because they had other prisoners coming down the road to beat on.”

James Gilbert for the

Hobbs News-Sun

J. B. Heard died in a prison camp in Osaka, Japan in 1943. Jack Finley passed away in Albuquerque, New Mexico on July 11, 2002.

Prisoner Is Dead

TULAROSA, OCT. 4, 1945 — Luther Henderson, member of the 200th, died of malaria a month after the fall of Bataan, his parents have been informed by Leslie Fleming of Alamogordo, liberated prisoner who has returned home.